Stupid Comic Tricks

The Salt Lake Tribune insists on publishing a right-wing-nut-job (RWNJ) crapfest comic called "Mallard Fillmore" (It also insists on publishing "Rose is Rose," but that is a complete nothingburger intended to avoid offending anyone and, while nauseating and in its own way insidious, it is ignorable.). The author of this comic strip is probably too big an idiot to realize how apropos the title is. Millard Fillmore, after finishing his stint as accidental POTUS, became the head of the Know-Nothing Party, the biggest collection of racist, anti-Catholic, anti-Semitic, anti-immigrant rednecks in the mid-19th Century US. This comic upholds that proud tradition.

This morning the shit-shoveling anidae revisited a topic near and dear to his heart: how conservative faculty members are being oppressed on college campuses. Having had contact with a few dozen universities of all stripes, I can say with confidence, "You are one shit-stuffed duck." Except at the private conservative schools such as Regent and BYU, the faculties were a mix of conservative and liberal, and no one seemed terribly muzzled.

The duck's chief source is the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE). This outfit has won a few cases of neutral substance that it trumpets on its website, but essentially it defends faculty members who either promote right-wing Christianity or oppose anti-hate-speech policies. They like claiming that Christians are oppressed, too, but I must say I have never seen Maranatha, Campus Crusade, or Fellowship of Christian Athletes heckled, accosted, or flat barred from campus the way I've seen happen to minority religions, and the degree of Christian cramdown in athletics is sick.

FIRE claims to be libertarian. The problem with libertarians (and any Randonazi mainlining Atlas Shrugged) is that their philosophy boils down to, "I don't want to, and you can't make me." That is the philosophy of 13-year-olds, and 13 is the age you hope most that kids can make it through without killing themselves or your having to kill them. Not much to base a society on, unless you want Lord of the Flies. It's also rather odd that the only rights they're interested in are conservative ones. Hmmm....

Sorry, Mal-nard, you're a whore, and so is your "authority."